An eye for Minneapolis
By Dan Olson
Minnesota Public Radio
February 5, 2002

A young Minnesota architect, raised in Nigeria and north Minneapolis, has won a prestigious national award. The American Institute of Architects has named Mohammed Lawal, a partner in the Minneapolis-based KKE firm, one of four recipients of the national young architect award. The 35 year old's projects include inner city and suburban school designs and the renovation of his neighborhood library. Minnesota Public Radio's Dan Olson reports.

One of Mohammed Lawal's projects is the Lucy Craft Laney public school in north Minneapolis. See larger images.
(Photo courtesy of KKE Architects)

Three years ago public school officials handed architect Mohammed Lawal a tall order. The fast growing southwest Twin Cities suburb's public schools are growing at a rate of 400 students a year. Schools officials said: build a school for ninth graders only, but build it so it can be changed to a grade school or a high school or even, principal Dennis Baldus says, a shopping center.

"If at some point we ever lost enrollment, it could be used for some commercial use, so he was given a lot of things to think about in the design of the building, and I think he's done a wonderful job in designing something with all those restrictions we put on him," says Baldus.

The design of the new ninth grade school is part of the reason that American Institute of Architects is giving one of its highest awards to Lawal. He says he wondered what kind of design would help young people who are in the building for only one year feel at home.

He says he hit upon the concept of a sea shell - the nautilus.

Lawal's connection with young people goes beyond designing schools. He and two colleagues started KKE's Architectural Youth Program to introduce high school juniors and seniors to architecture.
(MPR Photo/Dan Olson)

"The eye of the storm, as we call it, is the media center with an elliptical-shaped space and the main academic wing spirals around from that and ends up in the stomach, which is the cafeteria, which is the main social gathering space in the building," he said.

Lawal's connection with young people goes beyond designing schools. He and two colleagues started KKE's Architectural Youth Program to introduce high school juniors and seniors to architecture.

Former Minneapolis North High School graduate Keon Blassingame was one of the first students. "He's a busy man, he's a principal at an architecture firm, he's on the board, he has several projects going on at one time and he still takes the time to go talk to a bunch of high school kids from Minneapolis who are minorities or at risk, who might not otherwise have been exposed to architecture," says Blassingame.

Blassingame is an architectural graduate student at the University of Minnesota who works with Lawal in the youth program. They encourage women and minorities to take the course, groups Lawal says are under represented in a profession which more often attracts young people from privileged backgrounds.

"It's any kids that we think are looking for career options they tend to be artistic kids, some aren't sure what they want to go into, and our program is designed to show that you can be an architect without necessarily being a high achiever in economics or something like that," he says.

The next project on Lawal's table is the renovation of the Sumner Branch of the Minneapolis Public Library system, his childhood library in north Minneapolis.
(MPR Photo/Dan Olson)

Lawal lived in north Minneapolis until he was nine. He moved to Nigeria, his father's country, for his teen years, then back to Minnesota for college.

The next project on his table is the renovation of the Sumner Branch of the Minneapolis Public Library system, his childhood library in north Minneapolis.

Lawal remembers Saturday afternoon library trips there with his mother to check out books. "When we got short-listed for the project, I called her up and asked her, 'What do you know about the Sumner library?' and mom said, 'Well I hope we don't have $1,000 in overdue fines,'" he recalls.

Fines, if they exist, have not been part of the discussions.

Mohammed Lawal's other projects include the Lucy Craft Laney public school in north Minneapolis, and a new high school being designed for the Twin Cities suburb of Rogers.